


dreams and memories

by orphan_account



Category: Captain America (Movies), Doctor Who, Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: F/M, Post-Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Season/Series 08
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-09-24
Updated: 2014-09-24
Packaged: 2018-02-16 12:34:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,305
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2269869
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He was the man from her dream. The man who had lifted her up on the table, kissed her like there was no tomorrow, then disappeared.</p>
            </blockquote>





	dreams and memories

**Author's Note:**

> so my dear friend daisy had started me on barneswald and the tumblr tag is unsatisfyingly incomplete. i decided to add to it.  
> also, it's interesting and kinda hard to write twelve because we haven't seen all that much of him, so i don't feel like i know him as well. but it's still fun!  
> also, apologies for the utterly crappy title. seriously.

_"Don't say goodbye, James," she pleads. "Please."_

_The soldier smirks. "What should I say, then?"_

_The girl buries her face in his shoulder. "Just kiss me, you idiot. Kiss me and say you'll see me later."_

_"Well." He hoists her onto the rickety table of his apartment. "That can be arranged."_

_And they kiss like there's no tomorrow, which there might not be. The next morning, when he leaves her on her doorstep, he tells her,_

_"See you 'round, darling."_

_"Don't be late, sarge," she shoots back, a smile on her face and tears in her eyes._

_And he hurries down the street, back hunched against the beating rain._

_It's the last time they see each other._

 

Clara opened her eyes, watery morning light filtering through the annoyingly filmy curtains of her apartment. She tried to hang onto the last moments of her dream, but they were already slipping away. There was a man, Jeremy or Julian or...was it James? Jamie? She couldn't remember. 

She sighed and swung her legs out of bed, turning off her alarm. Nothing she can do about it now. 

When she got into the kitchen, there was a familiar blue box standing in the corner, right in front of the fridge. She sighed and rapped sharply on the door of the TARDIS. 

"Ah, hello Clara!" the Doctor exclaimed, sticking his head out. 

"You're parked in front of my fridge." 

"Well..." He was silent for a moment, searching for an adequate comeback. "There's one in here!" 

Clara sighed again. "I'm not even dressed. It's Tuesday morning, Doctor. I have work today." 

"What do you even _do_ at work?" 

"I teach people!" 

The alien rolled his eyes. 

"They can wait for one day." 

"Um, not really. I'll only come if you promise to drop me off at school.  _On time._ " 

"Fine. Fine, I'll do that. Just come!" 

And he dragged her into the box, the door swinging shut behind her. 

 

"Here we are," the Doctor said, with a wide, dramatic swoop of his hand. "New York." 

"Why New York?" Clara questioned. She was becoming very suspicious of her friend's behavior. First, showing up at seven AM on a Tuesday, then making her find something in the TARDIS wardrobe to wear instead of her own clothes, and lastly, he was being actually  _nice_ to her. As in, properly nice. Normal-person nice. 

_Clara, are you hungry? Should I make toast? Keep the clothes, consider them a gift from me. No, I can't tell you where we're going. It's a surprise._

"Just because," he replied in that thick Scottish accent. 

She squinted a bit. "What are you up to?" 

"Me? Why would I be up to anything?" the alien replied, much too quickly. 

"It's a shame, Doctor." She clicked her tongue disapprovingly. 

"What is?" 

"That you're such a bad liar this time." 

The Doctor stood there for a moment, regarding her. Then he said, 

"Are you absolutely, one-hundred percent sure that I don't pay you?" 

Clara smirked. "Even more than that. I told you, Doctor: you couldn't afford me." 

 

"Bucky!" Steve called. "You ready?" 

There was a grunt from the other room, a crash, then silence. 

"Buck?" 

"Damn it, Steve," the Winter Soldier roared. "Get Stark to stop messing with my arm!" 

Steve's lips twitched, and he was glad that his friend couldn't see it. "What'd he do this time?" 

There was another silence, and Bucky poked his head through the doorway of his bedroom. 

"He fucking magnetized it." 

The blond man struggled to keep a straight face. 

"Can you fix it?" he asked finally. 

"Maybe, but I'll need a while." 

"Well..." Steve sighed. "Okay. Okay, fine. I need to make a phone call." 

 

 "Sooo, Doctor?"

"Yes, Clara?"

"Any particular reason that you're bringing me to Central Park in fancy clothes on a Tuesday morning?"

"It's Tuesday afternoon here," the Doctor corrected. "Time travel and time difference."

"Yeah, whatever. Are you going to keep avoiding my question?"

"Yes."

Clara sighed. She'd been doing an awful lot of sighing today, she noted.

The Doctor let out a satisfied, "Ah," all of a sudden, and Clara looked up, following his gaze.

There were two men walking towards them. The blond one sported jeans and a tee-shirt, a baseball cap, and large glasses. The other one was shorter, wearing a large black hoodie with jeans, and a similar hat.

"Doctor? Who- who are they?"

The Time Lord didn't answer, but an infuriating smirk invaded his face.

Clara frowned a little. There was something almost...familiar about the smaller one's gait, the way he held himself.

The blond one nudged him, and he looked up.

Clara's breath stopped coming.

 

"Hey, Buck. Look up." Steve nudged his friend.

"Why?"

"Just do it. You have to see this."

Bucky raised his eyes toward the two people they had been walking towards, then his whole head jerked up.

No.

That was impossible.

She was _dead_.

"S-steve," he stammered. "What..."

"Go, Bucky. I promise you, she's alive," his best friend reassured him. "She's real. She's not a ghost, or a hallucination."

The smaller man nodded absently, eyes still trained on the girl's face.

_Connie._

 

"Doctor... Doctor, who is that? Why does he look so familiar?"

"Last night, you had a dream, didn't you? About a man?"

"I...I guess. I don't know. I can't remember!"

"He wasn't a dream, Clara," the Doctor said gently. "He's a memory."

Clara frowned and shook her head. "But... I've never seen him before. How can he be a memory?"

"You always dream about people you've seen before. That's how your brain works. You can't just _make up_ any old character."

She took a shaky breath, unable to take her eyes off the man's face. She could see his lips moving: he was muttering something under his breath, like an incantation or a prayer.

"I don't...I don't know him. I don't. I can't. I would remember. Right?"

 

"Connie. Connie Connie Connie." Bucky kept repeating the name to himself, because he was afraid that he would forget her like he forgot everyone else.

Like he forgot Steve.

He finally finally  _finally_ got close enough to Connie to be able to see every detail of her face, hear every word she uttered.

"Connie," he whispered.

She froze. Slowly, slowly lifted her head until she was looking straight at him. He knew she was trying not to cry.

 _Don't cry_ , she was repeating to herself. _Don't cry don't cry don't cry._

She did the same thing before too. Before he was the Winter Soldier, before the war. He knew she didn't like crying.

"Who...who's Connie?" she whispered back.

 

She didn't know how to answer the man. She could see the hope in his face, and the sadness, anger, fear, loss. And she couldn't play along, pretend to recognize this broken creature. She wasn't cruel.

And yet, she could see that her answer pained him more than any other could have.

And she realized that maybe she should have asked, _W_ _ho are you?_ instead.

And that maybe, she should have clarified that, "I'm Clara. Oswald." She took a deep breath, trying to calm herself down. She didn't like crying.

"Clara Oswald. And you?"

The blond man stepped forward, seeing that his companion was unable to answer, broken, just an echo - like her, but different. Worse.

"I'm Steve Rogers." He extended his hand and she took it, hers still trembling. "This is Bucky Barnes."

 

Bucky, through the haze of _what's happening why doesn't she remember me or who she is what have I done am I really such a monster that she doesn't even recognize me,_ noticed that a) Connie was called Clara, b) she had an accent that was decidedly not American, and c) something happened to her face when Steve said his name.

She didn't react to _Steve Rogers_. There was no, 'Are you Captain America?' or 'You seem familiar, have I seen you somewhere?' But when Connie/Clara heard _his_ name, she straightened up and retreated back at the same time.

Bucky thought he knew Connie. But this wasn't Connie, this was Clara.

 

"B-bucky Barnes..." she whispered. It was familiar, so familiar.

Where had she heard it?

A series of images came back to her suddenly.

_A run-down apartment. Kisses on a creaky table. A figure running home in the rain._

_"Don't be late, sarge!"_

_Don't be late._

_Come back to me, Bucky._

_Don't die._

He was the man from her dream. The man who had lifted her up on the table, kissed her like there was no tomorrow, then disappeared.

Bucky Barnes.

 

Bucky didn't know what happened, what changed when she heard his name.

It was almost like there was a glimmer of fear, of recognition, of...of love? Hope? Maybe not quite that far. 

But there was something. 

 

Clara froze, unable to remember a thing. Her mind was disorganized, her thoughts were flying every which way and she couldn't focus on any of them.

The Doctor took her hand gently, too gently.

Why was the Doctor being gentle? With _her_ of all people?

She tore her arm away, not quite caring about the flash of _what did I do wrong_ in his eyes. She needed to figure out what was going on, and she couldn't do it with any type of outside distraction.

_What do I do when I can't figure something out?_

_I take deep breaths_ , she told herself. _I talk it out. I pace._

That was right. That was it. She liked to pace, to withdraw herself from the world, and talk all the while. Hearing her own voice comforted her in a strange, egocentric way. It meant she was still alive, still breathing. The world hadn't ended yet.

 

Bucky gripped Steve's arm, trying to organize his thoughts. He did that sometimes, grabbed onto Steve's hand or arm, as if it would keep him from drowning, from being carried away. It was his anchor to the real world, because when nothing else made sense, Steve Rogers did.

He felt a rough, warm hand cover his cold one comfortingly, and knew it would be okay. Eventually. 

 

Throughout the whole walk back to the TARDIS, Clara chattered to herself. She talked about her strange dream/memories, the weather, her students at school, the bizarre trips she'd been on with the Doctor. She was vaguely awake that Bucky Barnes was holding onto his friend's arm, tightly, as if he would never let go. She also knew that the Doctor was listening, or at least pretending to, just so she didn't look like some crazy woman talking to the air. 

When they reached the small blue box, she went straight inside, leaving Steve and Bucky to their it's-bigger-on-the-inside shock.

She was pacing a hallway - she wasn't quite sure where - when a voice interrupted her.

"Con- uh, Clara?"

She looked behind her, and saw Bucky Barnes leaning against the wall.

"Yeah?"

"I just came to find you. You've been gone for a while."

Clara shook her head. "I just got here."

"The Doctor sent me to look for you."

"That's a lie. He does that sometimes, the lying. What the Doctor really wants is for us to have some 'alone time'."

Bucky shrugged, and Clara tried to decided whether to start an actual conversation with this man who was in love with her during World War II. 

"Back then," she blurted out, "back then, I was called Connie?" 

He looked surprised, but nodded. 

"Was I...I mean, did I have an American accent?" 

The ghost of a smile passed over his face. "Yeah. Do you really not remember?" 

 

Clara looked sad. Bucky could see that his question made her sad. But he had to ask.

"I...no. I'm sorry. Sometimes I just remember these things that I know couldn't possibly have been real, but sometimes it turns out that they are."

"Do you know what happened to you? The old you, I mean. Connie."

"Well..." She fiddled with a loose thread on her dress. "I died. To save the Doctor." She paused, collecting her thoughts. "I mean, I'm not quite sure how. But that's what all my echoes do. Will do. Have done. They die to save the Doctor's life. I can't really do much about it."

"Oh." Bucky felt a strange sense of disappointment. He didn't know why, and he didn't want to find out. 

 

It was nice, being able to talk to Bucky Barnes like this, like normal people, with no one freaking out - which, admittedly, they had both done in Central Park. 

Clara had lots of questions, but she knew she could ask them later. There would be time. 

_You have a metal arm?_

_What exactly happened to you?_

_Why did the Doctor try to reunite us?_

_Why?_

There would be time to get to know each other, to become friends, to trust. 

There would be time for all of that.

 

Bucky had so many questions for Clara, but he knew he couldn't ask all of them now. He could wait, though. They had time.

They had time for things like,

_Explain to me again why there are different Claras._

_Why do you die every time?_

_Will you...will you die this time?  
_

They had time to get reacquainted, to learn each other's favorite colors, songs, food all over again. They had time to learn to trust each other.

They had time to dig up lost memories and find proof of their past lives. 

 

They had a time machine. They could waste all the time they wanted, and still be back before breakfast. They could go anywhere and still not miss Steve's birthday. They could go dancing in the 1800s and still get home in time to fall into bed, exhausted. 

They could conquer the world, just like they had all those years ago.


End file.
